Troy McComb, author of The House on Mayberry Road.

Troy was introduced to us by another author who enjoys the horror genre. After some correspondence back and forth, and learning a little about him, we wanted to feature him as a great role model for people, especially young people, who want to pursue their love of writing but fear some obstacle such as health problems or family situations or the economy will prevent them from succeeding. We'll let Troy explain.

Troy...

Why do I write? That’s like asking a fish how it swims. I have to write. There’s no other way around it. If I don’t write, I’m not happy. Writing is my way of life.

I started this art form back in third grade when my teacher made us students write a short story for class credit. I thought it sounded fun, but had no idea just how much. From that day on, I knew that THAT’S what I wanted to do with the rest of my earthly life. I was nine then; I’m 31 now. Nothing’s really changed. Today, while most of my peers have no clue what they want to do in their 30’s, I, on the other hand, have always known. I’m very lucky.

Writing, to me, is also very therapeutic. When I get involved with my characters, or action, or plot, or dialogue, the negatives of the real world drift away. Not only that, but since childhood, I’ve always had a crippling social anxiety disorder. Being in public or around groups of people--I always feel unwelcome. Like the black sheep who doesn’t belong. I even used to have panic attacks so severe, I’d black out. I still have trouble to talking to people I don’t know, and I still don’t like to really leave my house. Creating stories helps me talk, helps me leave. Without it, where would I be?

Horror has always been my forte. I love horror films, horror novels, horror everything. Though I have greatly branched out into other genres over the years, horror still remains my ‘thing’. It doesn’t need to be bloody or violent. It just has to be unique and riveting.

As to where I got the idea for The House on Mayberry Road … the very first chapter. I had the first chapter in my head for some time and thought it would make a great beginning to a story. I wanted to write a haunted house story that really hadn’t been done before. Sure, ghosts can be scary. Sure, demons can be evil or violent. But what if there was something possibly worse than both? Something unidentifiable? Something nobody can begin to understand?

And so, The House on Mayberry Road was born!!

Thank you, Troy, and good luck. The House on Mayberry Road is available at Amazon.com

Linda Acaster, author of Torc of Moonlight

Linda Acaster is one of the delightful people we've met at Book Junkies, a Facebook Group that many of our Beans enjoy. Torc of Moonlight is a set of thrillers set in England - where else? We're glad to have Linda here to talk about her writing process. Linda...

When I was at school the bulldozer flattening the ground for a new playing field unearthed a Celtic settlement right beneath the window where my desk stood. There was no going back after that grandstand view. British history became a part of my DNA.

In the UK we are surrounded by the stuff of history, though many people don’t realise, focusing instead on the rush of their 21st century lives. In most city centres it’s easy to note where grand mid 19th century buildings have been replaced by 1950s/60s utilitarian structures, and so work out the drop-line of that particular stick of bombs during Word War 2.

In archetypal English villages I check out the duck pond, or the remains of the village pump, looking at the street signs and noting the name of the mediaeval church. St Helen’s Lane and Bugg Lane refer to the same thing – a water source that had an attendant female deity guarding it, Christianised via one name and demonised via the other. I could lay money on the mediaeval church close by being an All Saints or an All Souls, its festival dedicated to the time of year now commercially known as Halloween.

Being a writer means keeping my eyes open and my senses attuned to connections invisible to most people. It means researching to help fill in the gaps, and then having the faith to step across that Rainbow Bridge into a history that isn’t just a heap of stones or a delve in the earth, but a living entity populated by people like us except with different skills and expectations. And making them come alive for the reader.

I’m a ‘show’ writer by nature. I don’t watch my characters on a movie screen in my head; I research until I can empathise enough to slip into a character’s skin, feel with his or her emotions, see with his or her eyes, then I write as the story evolves around me. Novelists don’t truly deal in stories, they deal in emotional content using the language as a cipher that readers decode and experience for themselves. Horror, Thriller, Romance… these aren’t just genre titles, they’re descriptions of emotional content.

Thank you, Linda. Linda Acaster is the author of contemporary supernatural thriller Torc of Moonlight, Book 1 in the Celtic Goddess Trilogy, set very much on her home turf, three historical novels and 70+ short stories, some included in her forthcoming non-fiction ebook Reading a Writer’s Mind – Exploring Short Fiction.

Sean Sweeney, author of Model Agent, Rogue Agent, and many others

Sean Sweeney just hit a landmark for an independently published author. After several years and more than ten novels and short stories, he celebrated his 2000th sale. With drive, social media savvy and no small measure of talent, Sean is proof that the dream is not only still alive, but thriving and we're proud to have him here today. Sean...

I started a vegetable garden a few weeks ago. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do; my mother’s father, God rest his soul, loved to play in his little garden in the backyard, and everything he’d bring us tasted so good. He’d plant tomatoes, squash, beans, and cucumbers. Sometimes when I went over to the hacienda, I’d go in the back with him and watch as he checked on the veggies; I was so fascinated with the growing process and how things took off in that patch of earth.

My uncle gave me two tomato plants just before Memorial Day weekend, and in that time, my garden has grown quite literally. I’ve picked up three new tomato plants (one that had already born some fruit, just don’t tell anyone), as well as cucumbers, squash, zucchini, beans (the squash and zucchini I’ve raised from seed), peppers, and carrots; next Spring, I’m planting strawberries. By the way, don’t tell my uncle that the two tomato plants are literally thriving in my care, since they are nearly 18 inches high while his are probably six inches shorter at my last check. Everything is growing, for the most part, and for a newbie green thumb like myself, the rewards of seeing something you’ve planted or cared for blossom and bloom is an incredible feeling.

The same goes for writing. An author plants the seed (the concept) and cultivates it and nurtures it until the plant, in this case, the story, blossoms into a work suitable to be pruned… erm, edited. The gardener/author looks for things that don’t work, like dried leaves or passive voice. Passages that don’t work are on the chopping block, much in the way that weeds can strangle a plant are plucked from the dirt.

For this typist, one who has been doing this writing thing for a little over eight years, I’m always giddy at the prospect of writing a new story, more so than I am at the sprouting of a new plant. Earlier this week, I wrote a short story for a friend’s anthology, and today I start another for another friend’s anthology (it’s tough to be in demand sometimes). Once that’s done, I’ll be deeply engrossed in writing the first draft to my next thriller novel in my AGENT series. And I’m awaiting the galleys for my geared-to-teens zombie novel that is coming out in August.

There’s one thing I’ve learned when it comes to writing a novel, if I may use my gardening analogy once again. Writing takes time, much like growing a plant. It is natural for us as petty humans to want to rush the finished project (remember, I bought a store-cultivated plant with fruit on it already). A gardener doesn’t wave a magic wand and poof, there’s your vegetables or flowers. An author isn’t that way, either. Readers shouldn’t expect that, for a third.

The lesson: Don’t pressure your work and don’t pressure yourself. Your work will get there, and the reading will be delicious at the end.

Take it from me. I’m a gardener.

Sean Sweeney is the author of 10 novels, including the highly popular AGENT thriller series featuring Jaclyn Johnson, as well as several short stories and novellas under his real name and his pseudonym John Fitch V. He's hard at work on the next book in the AGENT series, Double Agent. Find out more about Sean and all of his titles in other genres such as fantasy and sports fiction at his website. His books are available for Kindle and Nook.

Karlton B. Douglas is a friend of Emjae Edwards. She was privileged to have read Comanche Justice before it was published and spoke so highly of it and the author that we knew we wanted to know about him and the development of his unique style. Karlton...

What Writers Write and How They Write It

---Karlton B. Douglas, author of Comanche Justice and Other Tales of the West

In 1987 I found myself bored senseless while working in a Midwest factory, repetitively bending metal parts to build a refrigerator. It was a mindless job that allowed my imagination to wander. While I was working I pictured in my mind a young man riding upon the back of a Griffin. That was the beginning of a Fantasy story that I would publish two decades later. Over the years I kept my imagination busy by reading, but there came a time when I felt driven to create my own worlds and characters. I like Fantasy because it is mostly creating ex nihilo (out of nothing). That is a demanding genre. You have to be creative with the setting, usually making an entirely new world for your characters to exist in. And then your characters have to be believable in that setting. It was no accident that Eris, the world of Griffin Island, was building in my imagination for about two decades before it reached its final form in publication. Then there was Shalihar. There is a reason Fantasy authors like Terry Brooks continually write books set in the same Fantasy world—there is a great deal of time and effort in world building that you hate to let go of a world you are so invested in. With Griffin Island and Eris I made it a young world with a short history. I decided with Shalihar to make it an old world with no end in sight. That way I could continually build the world and its characters. I published my first Shalihar Fantasy novella over a year ago. I also write non-fiction and fiction in other genres, such as Frontier and Western. These demand not just imagination, but the ability to give the characters substance and the stories depth while being set in our own world, even if in a different time than our own. Recently I published fourteen of my Western short stories. If a writer is focused upon a historical event in their story, then research becomes very important. The same thing goes for writing about an actual historic figure. We owe it to our readers to keep our story accurate and within the realm of how a particular historic figure acted in his or her time. I drew my Western stories from many things, some from actual characters and events, others from experiences in my life or the lives of others, and there were some stories simply born out of my imagination. In fiction we need to be able to tell a compelling story, one that draws a reader in and holds their attention. An author can have the greatest of skill with grammar and punctuation, but if they cannot tell a compelling story, the packaging is worthless. I once gave a lady feedback on a story she wrote. Her writing skills were perfect, but it was obvious to me that she did not believe what she was writing. And if she did not believe it, how could she expect her readers to believe it? When writing a story an author had better believe that the world, the time, and the characters are as real as this text before you right now. You must suspend “primary belief” and enter “secondary belief” so that you can tell a compelling story. Every writer must do this, whether writing Fantasy, Historical Fiction, or Romance—those characters and that story must become your reality as long as you are writing about it. If we believe in what we are writing while we are writing it, our readers will be able to suspend disbelief and enter our stories. Honing and polishing a story are important. A good cover and good editing for a book are priceless, but what sells a book is a believable, interesting, captivating story. Always give me an author who can tell a good story. I will forgive an author their imperfect prose if they can simply tell me a good tale. And that is my hope with every story I write, to simply tell a good tale.

Thank you, Kartlon. Karlton's books are available for Kindle and in print at Amazon.com

Rusty Coats - author of Out of Touch

Rusty Coats knows a bit about the written word. He's built a career in journalism that has gone from press room to the board room. He's sold newspapers, reported in newspapers, reported about newspapers, and taught newspaper owners how to sell themselves. He and his wife, Janet, own Coats2Coats, a media consultancy which helps newspapers and other corporations utilize the digital marketplace. Rusty also knows how to tell a story that keeps you gripping your Kindle to the very end. Rusty...

What
Writers Write

I’m a
morning writer, and warm up – like a baseball player – by reviewing yesterday’s
plays. I edit what I wrote, weed out all the little lovelies and tighten the
prose, then flow into what’s next. I don’t believe in lightning striking. I
believe in hard work.

I’m a
visual writer; I know a story or novel is coalescing when I begin cutting
pictures out of magazines, catalogues, architecture books, Hubble satellite
images – anything to ground the characters and places. I outline extensively on
plot and often graph my work on a three-act arc. And I edit extensively; using
an old journalist trick to make copy fit: I’ll change the margins of my page to
tighten the paragraphs, shaving widowed lines, so that I cut each chapter by 20
percent. My goal is to have a tight story, vivid characters and lean prose.

I used
to carry notebooks to catch dialogue in the wild. Now it all goes on my iPhone.
The couple clearly not fighting at
the bar. The businesswoman outside the boardroom changing character as she abrades
to her sales manager, then giggles with her daughter. The executive explaining
to a TSA agent that his C-PAP is not a video game console. Another journalist
trick: I try to disappear in crowds so I can hear people talk, rather than speak
in pre-packaged quotes.

I read
slowly because I’m mining. Sentence construction, character arc, the first seed
of foreshadowing, the echo effect of a good callback, the serrated edge of a
good cliffhanger. My wife devours four books to my one. Next to her, I feel
like Charly in “Flowers for Algernon.” Early Charly.

I keep a
baseball mitt on my desk. When I’m blocked, I snap the ball into the pocket,
changing grips. Fastball, slider, knuckleball, curve.

The
drive to write – through Godzilla plays in fifth grade, newspaper columns and
investigative reports for various newspapers, science fiction stories and an
unfortunate Generation X novel – comes from the joy of creation. It’s the
opportunity to get into a reader’s head and her heart. It’s everything Daniel
Pink writes about in “Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us” –
autonomy, mastery, purpose.

Really,
though, it’s this: I’ve had titles ranging from intern to vice president, GM to
board chairman, but that wasn’t what I called myself, not who I am.

I’m a
writer.

You are indeed. Thank you, Rusty, and welcome to the Hill O'Beans. Rusty's novel, Out of Touch, is available now at all the usual places. See the menu board for links and prices.

Susan Wells Bennett - Circle City Blues, The Thief of Todays and Tomorrows, The Prophet's Wives and her brand new An Unassigned Life

We first met Susan when she wrote a wonderful, thoughtful review of Steven Revare's Raw, a Novel. Several pleasant emails later, we were talking about her books, her plans, and how Inknbeans Press might be able to be involved with both. Now she's one of us, and we're very happy to have her. She brings a new voice to every protagonist, and new situations to display common emotions. Here's how she does it. Susan...

What Writers Write and How They Write It Essay
Susan Wells Bennett
In July 2009, I sat down in front of my
computer and made a promise to myself: I would write a thousand words a day and
not worry about editing what I’d written until I had a complete novel. Four
months later, I had the 120,000-word manuscript for what would become The Thief of Todays and Tomorrows. The
sense of accomplishment was so much more than I could have imagined – like
getting high without all the nasty side effects, save one: I was addicted.

It took me the better part of three months
to edit my first novel down to a more reasonable size of 90,000 words. Editing
my own work taught me a lot and changed the way I write forever. I try to avoid
words I know I will later want to edit out, like probably, maybe, and perhaps. I keep a character name list in
an effort to ensure I don’t switch names around as I write (this is still a
stumbling block for me, even with the list). And I read my dialogue aloud as I
write it.

My desk is a cluttered jumble of reference
books, including one that boasts 30,001 baby names. Because I know that I prefer
names that start with hard Cs or Ks, I now force myself to choose the first
letters of names at random. If I find myself unsure of what happens next, I visit
Pogo.com and play a game or two while I mull it over.

I don’t create an outline before I begin to
write because an outline ruins the story for me. The characters tell me where
they want to go and I follow their lead. The end of one of my books is generally
just as much of a surprise to me as it is to the reader.

Because I never want to be without an idea
for my next novel, I keep a journal. Almost every day, I warm up by writing in
that journal, usually using writing exercises to create short scenes. This
journal has so far produced two novels: Circle
City Blues and An Unassigned Life,
which will be published by Inknbeans Press in February 2011.

I still write a thousand words a day when
I’m working on a new manuscript. If I don’t, I actually suffer from a kind of
withdrawal. Writing is more than my job – it’s my addiction. And nothing feels
better than finishing a book.

Thank you, Susan. Congratulations on your newest title, An Unassigned Life. We look forward to book number five with great anticipation.

All of Susan's work is available in all the usual ereader formats, as well as in print. See our menu board for links and prices.

A Renaissance Man of the first order, Arthur Levine has lived the American Adventure. An entrepreneur with the heart of a computer geek (or is it the other way around?), he's looked and lived the process of writing from all sides, from sharpening that first pencil, to publishing magazines. His heroes are funny, flawed and fraught with unplanned adventure. Arthur...

I love the month of January and this one is special. My wife and I just celebrated our fiftieth anniversary at the end of December. We have been blessed with three children and seven grandchildren.

The other reason I feel so privileged at this time of year is that thanks to New Years Resolutions, January is a month of new beginnings. I have been involved in new beginning for more than five years during which I’ve written seven novels, one of which I recently published. Johnny Oops is the principal character in my novel by the same name. Johnny travels the countryside experiencing new beginnings as he preaches the gospel of a new religion called Dialectic Spiritualism. He promotes touching others as a way to get in touch with your inner self, which in Johnny’s case is a delightful one foot tall albino with pink eyes named Inney. Johnny doesn’t know if he is real or if everything that happens to him is an illusion. He believes you can’t stop the future from happening, but you can alter your concept of reality. Life in Johnny’s eyes is a matter of perception. I think this is especially true for writers. Johnny can’t decide if he’s a prophet or a charlatan, or living in a virtual reality world controlled by a Game Master. Most of the time this self-doubter believes he is a messenger from God, but he’s never completely sure.

The adventure of Johnny’s life unfolds, as he grows from a young man conflicted enough about himself to experiment with drugs, drink to excess, and attempt suicide, to a grown up who sometimes prefers the escapism of dalliances with women to his more spiritual pursuits. I wonder how much our insecurities, doubts and fears factor into our thinking about our surroundings and what’s real when we write. In my case, all my writing is affected by the questions I have about life and the answers the characters in my novels develop such as how Johnny can escape a kidnapping in Egypt, or being crushed by the jagged rocks in an inlet of despair in France. Trying to determine what is fact and what is fiction becomes complicated as my characters take over and the story becomes theirs. Sometimes I think they have better answers than I do. Thank God for our imagination, which helps us and our characters find their voice.

If you'd like to know about Arthur or Johnny or what they perceive, check out the Johnny Oops blog or Arthur's fun and informative interview at Goodreads. Watch for our Ms. Pupps review of Johnny Oops, coming soon.

About sixteen months ago, the book we had been counting on and promoting as our debut product went from reality to fading memory in one day. Emjae, who until that moment had been here to work on promotions and marketing, stepped in with her first book, A Plane Proposal, and Inknbeans Press went from the drawing board to the world wide web and the term 'contemporary relationship fiction' was born. Seven books later, she's still writing, and we're happy she is. Emjae...

Websters says there is a difference between vocation and avocation. That's true, unless you're a writer. Most people see writing as mere hobby, and while we might have to pursue other paths to wages, that does not mean our effort to write is simply filling time between work and sleep. One's vocation is that to which we are called, and any writer will tell you that the siren call of the keyboard might well be as strong as the call to ministry, medicine or law. Words and caffeine flow in equal parts with blood in our veins. Characters poke us into wakefulness in the middle of the night to whisper scenes and plot twists. Dialogue hums in our brains even as we try to converse with other people. There's no escaping that urge - that need to tell the tale.

It's a popular question on one of my favourite chat forums; outline or seat-of-the-pants? I am a listener. I sit at the keyboard, or take up my pen, pour the tea, crank up the music and let the words come. Sometimes they rush at me like angry waves; tugging, pushing, dragging so wildly I can hardly breathe. Sometimes they trickle out and I despair of ever finishing the project. Most of the time, however, I don't even see the words. They are just suddenly there. More times than I can count, I've shut down the computer at the end of the day feeling that I accomplished nothing and everything I just did will need to be rewritten. The next day, I open the file to find something wonderful has happened. Someone, a far better writer than me, has created something interesting, moving, entertaining of my wreck. I race over the narrative, mouth agape, thinking 'this is good!'.

Oh, I've tried to outline, but I seem to align myself with the most obdurate characters possible, and they never want to do what I tell them. I have yet to write a story that ended up even remotely the way I originally envisioned it. I think my characters are smarter than me. Cactus & Mistletoe is a perfect example. I chose the title just because it amused me, and I had no intention of ever seeing it explained in the story, much less having it become a plot point. And yet, one morning there it was. The ending was supposed to be fiery and involving a tertiary character, but before I knew it, Emma and Sawyer had worked everything out over a cuppa.

I wasn't always a smooshy, sugary, wine and roses sort of writer. When I was eight years old, I wrote a murder mystery. Really.

Happy Christmas!

Emjae's seven books are available through Inknbeans Press, Amazon.com, and all the usual outlets. See our menu board for a list of her titles, links and prices. Thank you, Emjae.

What Writers Write (and How They Write It) - Jim Burkett, Author of Declaration of Surrender

Jim Burkett, one of our newest beans, brings a tradition of military pride and exactitude to his work, blended with an optimistic view of the human condition. The combination is explosive; heart pounding action and heart warming hope. Jim...

Up until the point in life where one realizes they need to make a living in order to survive, I always had visions of working for the National Geographic or Time magazine as a photojournalist. The one constant that my oldest friends will tell you, is, I was never without a camera around my neck or a scratch pad to take notes on. When I wasn’t photographing every thing that moved, I was writing the next great story that I was sure would bring me a Pulitzer, if only in my mind.

It was through my photography that I first began writing a column for a local sailing magazine. One day, the publisher asked me to write a brief synopsis of what a particular photo was about, and I ended up submitting a story for it. He went ahead and printed both on the back page of the magazine and to our surprise, it was well received. For the next year, a photo and my article were the last thing a person saw and read in that magazine. From there I started writing short stories for other venues, which also took my photography to a professional level. Over the years I have had the privilege of photographing everything from rock bands to General Tommy Franks to the New York Yankees.

Growing up in a military family, my father made sure I read every news article pertaining to our government that I was capable of understanding at the time. It was important that I appreciate the fact that I was living in the greatest country on Earth. To him, the only things that mattered in life were our Armed Forces and government. I still continue this habit and it is through these readings and other historical materials that I have formed my proud beliefs in our nation. It is also how I began to visualize the story behind Declaration of Surrender.

Although the book is pure fiction, several years ago I began to read articles of turmoil within our government and how we were finding military spies in our own ranks, stealing and turning over sensitive documents to foreign countries. I began to wonder, if our own men and women were doing this, what was the possibility of our government officials doing it as well? What if they had become disheartened with where our country was heading, would they too become traitors? What would they do if faced with an impossible situation of losing a war?

The questions continued for several days until the overwhelming ones hit me. Would our own Congress sell out to save their own hides? Would they forfeit the citizens to save themselves? Deep within me, the answers were always “No”, but what if in that one instance of a possible truth, the answer was “Yes”.

On most days, after working my paying vocation, you will find me typing away on my laptop, still hoping to write that Pulitzer, or perhaps just trying to write a story that will bring an emotion or two to the reader. We're so pleased to be able to offer his first novel, Declaration of Surrender, in all the usual places and formats, and we look forward to the sequel, American Sanction in 2011. Thank you, Jim.

It's Autumn, the little ghouls and ghosts are putting together their wish lists for All Hallow's Eve, or as it is known in some parts of North America, Beggar's Night. It's time to pour great gobs of money into your local purveyor of sweeties and choccies to fill their grasping little fingers. It's time to listen for the hoot of a lone owl, to glance anxiously over your shoulder at that skittering sound behind you, it's time to fear the Reaper. Who better then to talk about the craft and process of writing this month than someone who writes about werewolves with affection? Judith Ann McDowell has written a love story full of howls, horrors and a need for flea collars. Judith....

My name is Judith Ann McDowell and I live in the Pacific Northwest with my husband Darrell and our two Pekingese, Tai and Chi and three kitties, Isis, Lacy and Reefer. When I am not busy writing, I like to travel and gather information about the paranormal. At first I was surprised to learn there are people, especially in Louisiana, who believe the werewolf actually exists. The Cajuns call it Rougarou. They aren't shy in talking about the creature. Thanks to their willingness to share their encounters, I now have a great picture for my next book cover on the sequel to ROUGAROU. This book is titled IN THE GLOW OF A FULL MOON RISING. ROUGAROU tells the story of Jonathan Hindel, a pillar of New Orleans' social elite and a werewolf. When Jonathan falls in love with the beautiful Angelia, the issue of Monsieur Devereaux and his mulatto mistress, he knows theirs is a union never to be sanctioned. A twist of fate presents itself, allowing Jonathan to change the course of their destiny. Jonathan is able to purchase his Angelia from Devereaux's embittered widow and spirit her away to his mansion in the bayous. All is bliss until the night Angelia stumbles upon Jonathan in the throes of satisfying his lust and hunger on the body of a young woman. When her screams of hurt and anger are at last silenced by the man who promised to love her throughout eternity, a strange ritual begins that is to prove his very words.

Thank you, Judith. Rougarou is available at Amazon. Judith's also written a more contemporary love story called Fated Memories, also available at Amazon.com.

Steven is our newest Bean. His literary fiction, Raw, a novel, will be coming next week. We've teased him about it, calling it the Great Cheese Manifesto, but actually it's about so much more. It's about goals, growth and Getting There. And it's probably the first book since that little girl went over the rainbow that makes Kansas 'home'. Here's Steve....

What Writers Write and How They Write ItKansas interests me. I’ve lived in the state my whole life. Sure, I’ve visited lots of other places: Paris, London, San Francisco... Branson. There are things I love about each of those places (try the gravy at Baldknobbers in Branson*), but Kansas inspires me with its geography, its people, and its overall feel.

I set my novel RAW in Manhattan, Kansas, right on the northern edge of the prairie. It’s not far from the geographical center of the contiguous United States. It’s about as far from the coasts as you canget. That is its appeal. It’s not a location most people know.

Yet, it is worth knowing. There are few places as beautiful as the tallgrass prairie. It takes work to appreciate it. As one of the characters in RAW puts it, “It takes an active, advanced intellect to find beauty in grass and sky. It’s an exercise in appreciating minimalism. Everything else is lazy beauty.”

My book concerns a guy who moves from Manhattan, New York, to Manhattan Kansas. We all know the story of a small-town person seeking success in the big city. It’s like that, except in reverse. The two cities couldnot be more different. The first is electric, exciting, crowded, confined, and squeezed tall by a scarcity of space. The latter is silent, flat, wide open, infinite, and sparsely populated.

Who settles in the middle of the country? Why did they go there in the first place? What keeps them there? To me, those questions offer interesting opportunities for exploration because the answers aren’teasy to guess.

Once a guy told me it was “easy living” out in the middle of Kansas. Fewer hassles. It’s really just different hassles, I think. More likely, he prefers the pace of things in Kansas. It’s more deliberate than mostplaces. It makes for a completely different feel. It challenges your perception of how quickly you have to move to get things done.

While I have lived in Kansas my whole life, most of that time was spent in Kansas City. As I learn more about what things are like to the west, I’ve found that the people, the geography, and the general atmosphereof the state has piqued my curiosity. It’s a complex place that deserves more exploration. Want to come along?

Thank you, Steven. We're glad to have you here. Check out Raw, a Novel September 30 and learn the real difference between Manhattan, New York and Manhattan, Kansas.

To learn more about Steven Revare, check out his website Slugworth, Inc. If you happen to be from Manhattan, Kansas, read the article Kimber Wallace wrote about Steven and his book in the Manhattan Mercury.

To paraphrase a very annoying beer advertisement...Get thirsty, my friends.

What Writers Write (And How They Write It) - Barbara Silkstone, author of The Love Investigator.

Barbara Silkstone, author of The Secret Diary of Alice in Wonderland, has recently had her hands full rounding up naked men to write about. A lot of naked men. 527 of them to be exact. She's funny, just a degree or two off center, and with her head at that angle she sees the world in quite a wonderfully different way. Let her tell you about it. Barbara...

I enjoy doing playful things with language.I love blending two distinct words to create a new word.If I’m laughing out loud when I’m writing, then I know I’ve hit the mark. I’m working on Wendy & the Lost Boys right now. I laugh so loud while I’m writing that the neighborhood committee has asked me to move.

Attending parochial school honed my sense of humor and survival skills. In seventh grade I started an underground newspaper patterned after Mad magazine.It included a love advice column which as I recall was quite funny and very naïve.One day our nun took the girls aside to explain the facts of life. She told us that boys have their intestines in a bag between their legs. We were never to touch that bag. With material like that to work with I had a ball writing my newspaper. Until Sister Irma confiscated my last edition and sat on it. I had to go up to her desk and ask her in Polish (our school’s second language) for my paper. She kept pretending she didn’t understand that she was sitting on my latest news. She nipped my budding career in journalism.

Perhaps that was the origin of The Love Investigator, 527 Naked Men & One Woman. The one thing I learned from interviewing over 500 men is that life is one big game; we just don’t know the rules. It’s a Wonderland. That got me thinking about Lewis Carroll. How would he have written Alice’s adventure in today’s world?

In The Secret Diary of Alice in Wonderland, Age 42 and Three-Quarters, my Alice skates the edge of logic. She’s naïve and constantly forcing reason where there wasn’t any. She’s surrounded by sensible nonsense. Alice believes what is told to her but still tries to sort it out.And when she’s had enough jabberwocky, she turns and kicks butt. I’m a big fan of Janet Evanovich and my Alice would love to hang out with her heroine, Stephanie Plum.

I live in South Florida. Over the years I have taken writing workshops with some of the greats: Stephen King, PD James, Robert B. Parker, and James Michener. As a single parent it was hard to find the time to write; but now I’m on a roll. I’ve found Kindle to be an excellent venue as no one will sit on a Kindle.

Thank you, Barbara. If you'd like to know more about Barbara, her naked men, her chicklit column, and her future projects, just go down the rabbit hole to her website.

What Writers Write

If you're here looking for the naked men Barbara Silkstone promised us, they'll be here this weekend. Minor glitch in the publishing process, and we wouldn't want to tease you with her feature and not be able to give you a link to buy all those naked men.

What Writers Write (And How They Write It) - Kristie Leigh Maguire, author of Second Chances.

Welcome. She's smart, she's sassy, she has a pen that drips sizzling ink. If you like steamy stories or the Happily Ever After kind, then this is a name that belongs on your bookshelf. Author of Second Chances, among others, Kristie's got the pedigree for writing romantic fiction; she's been writer, a publisher, a designer, and a part of her own HEA for years. Kristie...

How Writers Write

By Kristie Leigh Maguire

I traded in my desk for a corner on the couch where I am comfortably ensconced with my laptop on my lap, my feet propped up and reclining back against a mound of pillows. I look out my windows and marvel at the scenery, which changes frequently.

I am a modern day pioneer traveling in a recreational vehicle instead of a covered wagon, escaping the brutal summer heat of the Mojave Desert in southern Nevada where my husband and I live during the winters.

This year we left our home in Nevada near the end of April and headed to Louisiana to visit my ninety-three year old mother and two of my four brothers who still live in the area where I graduated from high school too many years ago to count. Then it was on to Alabama for my granddaughter’s graduation from high school. Where does the time go? It seems only yesterday that I was holding her in my arms right after she came into this world.

Speaking of graduating from high school, my husband wanted to attend his high school reunion this year. It had been fifty-one years since he graduated and he had never been back to any of his reunions. The only problem was that he graduated from high school in Kansas and we were in Alabama for my granddaughter’s graduation. There is quite a distance between Alabama and Kansas and we only had a week to travel the great distance. We made it though and spent a week in Kansas in my husband’s home town.

With no particular destination or anywhere we had to be at any certain time, we decided to head north after the reunion and traveled through Nebraska and into South Dakota. As I write this, we are parked at a campground in the Black Hills area of South Dakota among the tall pine trees and huge granite boulders scattered around.

Today we are going to see the monument to Crazy Horse carved into the face of a mountain and tomorrow we are going to Mount Rushmore where the faces of great past Presidents of the United States are carved into a mountain.

There is so much to see around this area that we could spend a few weeks here. And who knows? We may do just that. We have no particular place to be and no particular time to get there.

Life is wonderful as a modern day pioneer, exploring new territories and soaking up inspiration and ideas for many future stories that I can write when I get back home this winter.

If you want to know more about Kristie, visit her at her website. Her latest release is Second Chances, a contemporary western romance set in Wyoming. It is available in paperback, e-book, and Kindle versions.

Welcome. Michael E. Benson has been writing for years. As a police investigator, as a police instructor, as an entrepreneur, as a hobbyist, as an artist, words have always taken up a lot of space in his bag of tricks. Openers is just one of the many stories he has to tell. Here is how he prepares to tell those stories. Mike...

I never do a plot outline for a story except in my head.Before I start to write I will spend days, months, years plotting the story in my mind as a sort of continuing daydream.I edit, revise and edit some more until I have a chronology and major turning points firmly fixed in my mind.Then it’s just a question of getting from point A to point B to point C and so on to the end, filling in the points with narrative and dialogue.My favorite place and time to do this “mind plotting” is when I’m driving down the highway alone.Another favorite place is in bed in the middle of the afternoon.

I am fortunate to have an office in my home and a computer.I’ve tried writing in longhand, but when the story is flowing it’s just too slow.I can hardly keep up with it by typing on the computer and I’m a very good typist.When I was in the Coast Guard I was hooked up on a telephone line with four other people all talking at the same time.I had to listen to one particular voice in all that babble and translate what he said.Consequently, I developed the ability to shut out anything I don’t want to hear without having to wear headphones.When I am concentrating my wife now knows to make eye contact with me and make sure someone’s in there before she starts to talk.Otherwise, I won’t hear her.It’s a particularly useful gift to have when writing.

I thought I was a writer before I started working on my Master of Arts in History.I am a much better writer now than I was then, especially for that kind of writing where every word in every sentence is scrutinized.Passives are forbidden.When I’m writing history I examine every sentence to see if it is active or passive and throw out the passives.In writing fiction, however, passives can create tone so they are useful.For example, which sounds stronger of these two sentences: “Bat Masterson was elected city marshal.”Or, “the people elected Bat Masterson as city marshal.”The first is passive, the second active.In a history paper, only the second will do.In a novel, either will be useful depending on the context.

I am sporadic in my writing unless I’m facing a deadline.Some days I will sit at the computer all day long and write page after page.Other times, life outside writing takes over and I have to be away from the computer.On days when I can’t find time to write I will find time, usually just before bedtime, to edit which is equally important.

Here are a few hints for new writers:

1.A writer’s most important tool is the brain.Use it.

2.If you don’t respect your work, no one else will either.

3.Nothing happens until you initiate it.

If you want to know more about Michael and his works Openers and, coming soon, the second in the Frank Petrovic Series Alvarado's Woman, read his author page here at Inknbeans, or ask him a question in the comment corner.

Openers is available at Smashwords and Amazon.

What Writers Write - Lisa Hinsley, author of Coombe's Wood

Welcome. Those of you who recognize the name Lisa Hinsley know her as a gifted writer of downright spooky stories. These aren't your run of the mill vampyres and haunted castle stories; these are every day people in situations that run the gamut from good to bad and back again, touched by something...well...evil. Lisa does a good job of making you flinch.

Here's how she gets to that dark place that makes the rest of us shudder. You'll be surprised to know it's located in a surprisingly sunny place. Lisa...

Everyday I want to write. Even if I can’t figure out what I want to say, I’m thinking, plotting and planning what I will write when I’m able, organising in my mind until the story pops into perfect focus. Then it’s time to write. Having three children – at one point four as we had a foster child for a while – certainly curtails my ability to write when the muse strikes. Notebooks are excellent for catching those errant thoughts when there’s no time to flip up the lid to the laptop, to capture those perfect sentences that if not written somewhere will inevitably be forgotten. I have stacks of notebooks scattered all over the house (much to my husband’s annoyance). One day I must go through them all, figure out which are now defunct, and the book written. But I’m often thinking of several ideas at a time, and my notebooks are a collage of sometimes dozens of partly thought out stories.

The major rule my husband wisely imposed on me in regards to my writing is that our youngest son must be in bed before I begin for the night. I tend to get a little obsessive, especially when an idea is flowing, and I will ignore everything else in order to write. I have been known to cook with a notebook and pen beside me. I’ve even tried to use a Dictaphone, but the sound of my own voice creeps me out.

Unfortunately, I am still tied to a day job and supervise at a pharmacy four days a week. I originally trained as an interior designer, but worked as an architectural technician for many years. The downturn in the economy dried up my contracts, but I still have one client I draw for a few days a month. My dream is to be able to earn enough from my Amazon sales to give up the pharmacy position, and devote more time to writing.

My office is the left hand side of the sofa in our living room. If I really want to work, earphones are a requirement – the television is just too distracting. We’re moving up to the Wirral in the summer, the hope/dream is to get a house big enough for both of us (husband works from home) to have an office. When I’m in the zone, the music needs to be loud in my ears. It sort of focuses my mind. And each book needs a different artist (weird I know). Coombe’s Wood was Cold Play and Gomez. Another book of mine, Elective Suicide, was Elbow and Kasabian. I can’t work on them without playing one of their albums.

If you want to know more about Lisa and her books, Coombe's Wood and A Peculiar Collection, check out her author page at Amazon or visit her on Facebook.

One more note. Most of you recognize her picture above, but here's a completely different, and far less spooky picture.